Recent advances on regiocentric homo-epitaxial approaches in bio-mimetically derived artificial non-wettable surfaces

Abstract

Natural biosurfaces shows water repellence mainly because of its unique surface roughness and peculiar chemical compositions. Herein, we have mimicked the properties of the natural, non-wettable surfaces and created artificial water repellent surfaces using perpendicularly aligned zinc oxide (ZnO) nanostructured coatings having rough surface texture. These non-wettable surfaces were prepared through simple seed assisted hydrothermal methods. In the present method, a seed layer of nano regime zinc oxide was initially prepared on clean glass slides by coating and calcination methods. The as-synthesized seed layer was utilized for the hydrothermal growth of vertically oriented nanostructures. The structural and functional features of the resultant samples were studied using XRD, FTIR, UV-Vis. spectrophotometer and Contact angle analyzer. The homo-epitaxial growth and the crystallinity of ZnO nano particles were assessed using XRD. The structural studies were performed using FTIR and the optical transparency studies of the samples were carried out using UV–Vis. spectrophotometer. Along with the photographic image analyses, the water contact angle analyses were performed to predict the non-wettable character of the resultant coatings. At low nutrient solution concentrations (10 mM) and at low seed solution concentrations (1–10 mM), hydrophobic nanomaterials surfaces with high water contact angle, ˃130°, were successfully prepared through the present hydrothermal methods that extends many practical applications in biomedical, defense and industrial sectors.